Toxic Marriage Practices in South Asia

My grandma was married when she was 14. It was an arranged marriage and my grandpa was a few years older than her; not twice her age, but old enough that there was an inherent power dynamic between them. I remember her telling me that she was afraid of him, scared to interact, scared to have sex. She eventually warmed up to him, but what struck me was how she had normalized her experience. She didn’t think there was anything wrong with being intimidated by her husband’s presence immediately after marriage, or with the tradition of marrying strangers who were much older.

My grandma’s marriage wasn’t considered child marriage because she had hit puberty. She was already deemed a young woman who was fit to start a family. 14 was a suitable age for marriage in Bangladesh, especially in the 1970s. Unfortunately, it still is considered appropriate today.

I had barely started high school when I was 14. I didn’t even know how to cook or do laundry. I could barely even boil water and I didn’t know the first thing about sex. Only just learning how to think for myself, I had no idea how the world worked. How would I be able to support a family when I couldn’t even support myself?

Luckily, marriage was out of the question. Living in New York City, I had access to opportunities many of my relatives in Bangladesh didn’t have. I had told my parents that I did not want to get married until I had my degrees and a professional career. If I was still living in Bangladesh, I don’t think I would be so privileged.

Yesterday, my mom mentioned that one of my cousins who lived in Bangladesh was in 8th grade. She told me about how clever and worldly she already was. She explained that it was different from an 8th grader living in the United States because Bengali children had life experiences which made them more independent and mature. While it may be true that American children have a greater dependency on their parents, it is still wrong to consider a 14 year old of any background a mature adult, especially one ready for marriage.

My aunt was married to my uncle when she was 13. I think he was a legal adult at the time. She is a strong woman, a wonderful mother and wife, but thinking about the trauma child marriage must have caused her at the time is heartbreaking. The fact that she had to sacrifice her childhood to start a family that she wasn’t ready for, the miscarriage she experienced at 15, the emotional labor she’s had to put into her relationship and children, all are experiences she should not have been subjected to at such a young age.

When children are forced to grow up in this way, especially young girls who are married off by their families because they are too poor to take care of them, it harms them as a result. Considering young adolescents as independent adults just because they have gone through puberty is wrong, and inherently immoral. Not only can the child not consent to sex and marriage at such a young age, but the sexualization of children, especially young girls, ends up being normalized in the community. Society deems it as okay because the children are considered “marriage-ready” even though they are emotionally immature, despite the gravity of their childhood experiences.

When children go through this forced maturation, taking on adult responsibilities can result in depression and confusion. The brain goes through immense amounts of cognitive development through the teenage years and late adolescence, up until the early 20’s. Being forced to live as an adult when one is cognitively and emotionally immature can result in disaster. A 14 year old simply does not have the same mental capacity as a 22 year old, especially in regards to completing adult-oriented tasks. Forced maturation also stifles character development, since the children are being deprived of experiences that they would have experienced if they were not forced into early adulthood.

Although the tradition of arranged child marriage and hypersexualization of young girls in South Asian countries has existed for centuries, it is one that needs to be eliminated. Children should be left alone to develop at their own paces, not forced to comply with adult life or rapid maturation.

I wonder how different my grandma’s life would have been if she hadn’t been forced into an arranged marriage at 14. Maybe my mother would not exist, and consequently, neither would I. She would not have had to take on roles that she was far too young for in the first place.

Perhaps she would not retain the same archaic values that existed in her time. Although she was originally forced to comply, my grandma grew to support the same misogynistic mentalities that harmed her. This will continue to happen because of the normalization of “adult children” in South Asian countries, and it will result in thousands of girls having their lives ruined through child marriage. It is a mentality that exists in contemporary society despite the presence of numerous feminist movements. It is one that needs to be critically examined and eradicated, because a tradition which jeopardizes the innocence of children should not exist at all.

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